Licking Heights Local School District officials are looking for ways to pay for a roof design for the new high school they say will have more character, and more community impact for the arts.

Board members received another update regarding designs for the new high school at the July 17 board of education meeting.

The new high school, to be built adjacent to the existing high school building – which will in turn eventually become a middle school – is targeted for move-in during the month of August 2020.

Superintendent Dr. Philip Wagner said there is still work under way to contain construction costs, as the project is currently estimated to be about five percent over budget as currently, tentatively designed.

The overall high school building project budget is set at $59 million.

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At the same time, school officials are now working to find other cost saving measures – and potential public/private partnerships – in hopes of restoring elevated and more dramatically slanted roof lines that were removed in the most recent schematics and elevation drawings shared by Robertson Construction.

Those changes were made, it was pointed out, to try and trim costs and bring the project back into budget, according to Robertson representatives.

But board of education members said they felt the building loses some of its character and appeal with the changed rooflines, and they were particularly concerned by the potential loss of a fly space above the new high school’s auditorium.

It is hoped, board members said, that money can be found to restore the fly space, allowing for stage equipment to be hoisted upwards.

The vision, they said, is for the theater space to have a broader community use and become a local destination for theater productions potentially beyond just those involving students, making it a true community asset.

Jeremy Johnson of Robertson Construction said the window for making changes of that sort of scale to footprints or rooflines is narrowing.

Although the design process is now in a broad schematic phase in which smaller details can be adjusted and changed later in the process, the deadline is fast approaching for major details to be squared away so steps can be taken toward bidding processes and cost estimates critical to meeting what Johnson termed, “an aggressive” schedule necessary to meet the August 2020 move-in date for the ’20-’21 school year.

“At this point, you really want to be focusing on the footprints,” Johnson said. “You don’t want to be doing a lot of wall moving after this.”

While the board of education was tasked with approving a general schematic design at the July 17 meeting, Johnson emphasized there is still some time for officials to make a final determination on the roof lines and higher spaces above the auditorium and gymnasium if funding can be identified for those touches.

He said a decision would probably need to be made regarding the scope of the roofing toward the end of the first week in August.

Removal of the higher ceilings and other changes to the roof lines, Wagner said, were estimated to trim about $1 million from construction costs of the new school.

Wagner said there is also the possibility of building some portions of the structure with future student population growth in mind, but not finishing the interior of those spaces within the new school immediately to further curtail immediate construction costs.

Robertson officials noted in the newest schematics, based on discussion at a June 26 meeting, a roundabout in the area of the student parking lot that raised concerns has been removed, and some mechanical functions were shifted to a different part of the building to create greater efficiencies within music instruction spaces.